Sunday, September 26, 2004

What Time Did You Finish? (Yom Kippur edition)

Ok, people, time to answer the question on every set of Jewish lips. What time did you finish yesterday?

In the shteeble we took our first break at about 10 am for the selling of indulgences, I mean aliyos. That took 30 minutes. At 12:30 we had a one hour recess, so that the Rabbi and the chazon could go to the mikva(1)

After musaf, at 4:30 or so, we stopped for another 45 minutes, giving us about 2 hours and 15 minutes of break-time.

How about you?
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(1) I suppose it's important to get to the mikva, but it's also important to start musaf before the middle of the 7th daylight hour. We didn't make it. Starting musaf on time is so important, the Rema and the Mechaber urge congregations to skip parts of Shachris if it appears this deadline will be missed. Neither authority says anything about going to the mikva, so I don't know if they'd have advised the rabbi and chazon to skip the dip to allow us to start musaf on time. Anyone know?

We finished a few minutes late. The ladies were almost dropping. Thank G-d, I don't have trouble fasting. I was chasing after my kids until the last minute.

I haven't had a chance to read your whole blog. (when I get to work tomorrow I'll start at the beginning and hope to get through the whole thing by the end of the day) Looking forward to "getting to know you". Looks like you have a lot of interesting (to me) things to say. I'm BT only a few years. I feel like I don't know anything. I worry all the time about my kids, who are still really little, frieing out. I know a few FFB's who have. This frum life is so new to me. A new challenge and a new miracle everyday. Happy New Year.

We finished the morning service (Shacharis/Torah Service) about 1:30 then had a break until 5:30 when the Yizkor service started. (We don't do Musaf...I have yet to have time to ask the rabbi why, but I think it's because we follow a Reconstructionist siddur usually, and that movement does not do Musaf. Must be an objection to the sacrificed.

Since I don't attend Yizkor (Thank God) I came back at 6:00 for the Jonah discussion. We started Neilah at 6:45 and finished around 7:45, promptly retired to the courtyard for havdalah and then had a huge potluck break the fast. We also put the first screws in the sukkah, so we didn't get home again until about 9:30. Overall, it was a fantastic day!

Maybe the Rebbe made kiddush. oops, just, kidding. Although i am reminded of the Woody Allen Chasidic tale about the Rebbe who was so holy, he would trick the Yetzer Hara by giving in to it every time. Finished around two and change, had a break until 5:00 mincha. But I did not daven in a shul or Shtibel, but a house minyan set up for a Choleh, so things went much more quickly.

We finished Ne'elah at 7:48 pm, or 60 minutes after shkiah.(I don't know who's sheeta that is, though. The Geonim say 50; Rabenu Taam says 72. 60 is common, but I am not sure if it's a compromise, or a third opinion.)

We finished musaf at 3:15. We had the zchus of having Eitan Katz daven shachris and Rav Yehoshua Kurland daven KN, Musaf and Ne'ilah (our Rebbe davened ne'ilah in the downstairs minyan; we had over 300 people in the yeshiva shel matah and over 425 in the yeshiva shel ma'aleh). We finished approximately at 7:40 but sang and danced for another 15 minutes. It rocked.

I live in Yerushalayim, where the fast ended at 6:07 pm. (Gotta love that whole "Jewish country starting daylight savings the week before Yom Kippur to ease the burden of the fast" thing! Make aliyah!)

Anyhow, we finished Mussaf at 1:30 and then had a 2-hour break. Mincha was at 3:30. We blew shofar at exactly 6:08 (the chazzan was actually a few minutes ahead of time, and slowed down considerably toward the end so as to coincide with the end of the fast), then davened maariv and had a break-fast in the shule.

Funny, it didn't FEEL faster than the tefillot I used to attend in chu'l. It felt like a nice, reasonable pace for thinking about the words but not dragging out the services.

Shacharit started at 8:00 We finished Musaf around 1:45. Some of this shorter time is because:We have a very short Yizkor. It takes almost as long to have the people exit & come back in. Lots of communal singing and no real Chazzanut. The Rabbi only speaks for 15 minutes & that is before Neilah. We don't sell nor auction aliyot. Started Minca at 4:40. The tekia was at 7:35. The Shaliach Tzibbur had to stretch Neilah.

We started at 7:00 and finished Musaf about 14:20, I think (I had sneaked out before the Selihot of Musaf because I can't do the whole day straight without some kind of a break, so I alternate between missing the end of Musaf and part of the Torah reading of Minha). There was then an unscheduled 15-minute break between Minha and Ne'ila and I blew the shofar at 18:15.